Detroit Pistons' New Energy Or Just The Dead Cat Bounce?

After the surprising firing of Detroit Pistons Head Coach Mo Cheeks on Sunday, one of the big stories of this abbreviated, pre-All Star week is how Detroit would perform under interim coach John Loyer. With the important caveats that it's just one game, and they were playing a Spurs team without 3 of its top 6, Monday's 109-100 victory was nonetheless impressive. Especially noticeable was the Pistons' offensive execution. Under Mo Cheeks they ran some of the most boring, vanilla sets in the entire league. While Monday night was not perfect (Brandon Jennings still likes to pound the ball. Josh Smith still likes to take jump shots early in the shot clock), it was markedly better. One word comes to mind to describe how the Pistons were attacking, and up til now had only been associated with the variety of ways in which they squandered fourth quarter leads:

Creativity.

With virtually no practice time (probably only Monday's shootaround) it was surprising and gratifying to see some fresh and interesting looks from Detroit. Here, Detroit starts in a simple horns alignment, running a decoy pick-and-roll with Jennings and Andre Drummond leading to the real play, a quick handoff to Kyle Singler into middle pick-and-roll with Greg Monroe.

The early action from Drummond's crash to the rim successfully puts four Spurs on the right side of the floor, leaving Monroe and Jennings with a 2-on-1 situation against Cory Joseph:

Joseph has to make a quick decision to either stop Monroe and give the corner 3 to Jennings or stay home on the shooter. He gets caught in between and ends up getting called for the blocking foul on Monroe.Loyer also made some wise decisions in his play calls, letting one play set up the next. For example, early in the second quarter, Detroit runs this nice little back screen combo:

Note how Will Bynum's aggressiveness on the ball-side UCLA cut forces Patty Millsto drop off , leaving Mills in no position to contest Kyle Singler on the back cut as the two Spurs on the weakside of the play are slow to react. Another fun thing about this set is how it takes advantage of Smith's passing skills instead of just asking him to be a (woefully inaccurate) spot up shooter.On the very next possession, Bynum wisely assumed the backside defenders would be more alert to this action. While the Pistons run the same play, note how previously Jeff Ayres had stayed glued to Drummond:

and compare with how Aron Baynes (in for Ayres) drops to help on the back cut:

As Singler comes off of Smith's back screen, Baynes leaves Drummond:

The Pistons anticipated this help and immediately look to take advantage, with Bynum reversing the ball to Rodney Stuckey on the weakside. However, the execution isn't perfect, perhaps because it's been so long since Detroit engaged in this much off ball movement. The play was probably intended to finish with Stuckey curling off of the Drummond screen into the area vacated by Baynes helping on the initial back cut:

Stuckey is slightly tardy in using the Drummond screen, but is still able to break Marco Belinelli down off the dribble to get into the lane for the foul. If Detroit continues to use this set, the timing will only become better and counter plays like this will be more effective.One of the biggest knocks against Cheeks' offense was how it completely failed to account for the Pistons rather odd combination of personnel. Many of his sets asked Smith to simply stand in the corner and watch. Considering Smith is on pace for possibly the worst high volume 3 point shooting season in league history, and this stationary corner location did not allow him best use of his ball-handling and passing skills, this was not wise. However, as shown above, the increased ball and player movement allows Smith to employ his talents more usefully than bricking 20 footers.On the other hand, Detroit's most efficient post up player is Stuckey, a combo guard. Why not use him as a de facto post player in certain lineup combinations? This is exactly what Loyer did at times. Sharing the floor with Monroe, Bynum, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and Jonas Jerebko (employed as a stretch 4), the Pistons ran horns with Stuckey as one of the posts. These plays were successful both with Stuckey as a scorer:

And as a decoy:

In the first instance, Danny Green and Tim Duncan are placed at a disadvantage by Detroit's tight pick-and-roll set - when Monroe slips the screen, Duncan is forced to go with him, leaving Stuckey a straight-line drive to the basket before Green can recover from his attempt to "Ice" the pick-and-roll. Neither Boris Diaw nor Nando De Colo can prov ide help as they are covering shooters in each corner in Jerebko and Caldwell-Pope respectively:

In the second instance, Detroit is able to capitalize on Green's unfamiliarity with the help responsibilities of a post as he stays locked onto Stuckey instead of dropping into the lane to help as a 4 or 5 man would typically do:

And beyond the creativity of the sets, there was a new sense of purpose in the execution. For example, the Pistons, like every other team in the league like to run multiple screen-the-screener actions to allow a scorer to get the ball in a preferred location. All too often under Cheeks, Detroit would jog through these actions forcing the featured player to get the ball a little late, and a little further out than would be ideal. Against San Antonio, these sets were crisp, one screen or cut cascading into the next. For example:

The play is intended to get Monroe the ball on the deep right block. Each of the three distinct cuts is designed to prevent Tim Duncan from interfering with the catch. Duncan first must check Stuckey on the shuffle cut. Then must shade into the lane to prevent Jerebko from catching the ball in the paint after Monroe's downscreen. These adjustments leave him a perfect target for Stuckey's cross screen. Monroe catches the ball so deep to the basket that De Colo has no choice but to leave Caldwell-Pope alone in the corner for the open 3. An intricate play, requiring disciplined execution,which was simply not seen with any regularity under Cheeks.It is too early to say if Loyer will turn the Pistons' disappointing season around sufficiently to remove the "interim" from his title, since the roster is still horridly unbalanced. In truth, the half-court offensive execution waned in the second half after the Pistons built a big league and San Antonio played multiple possessions of zone. However, the early returns from Monday night can be nothing but encouraging for Pistons fans. While the pieces in place remain an uneasy fit, there appears to be someone in charge who will at least attempt to rearrange those pieces into a semblance of a functioning offense.

(Note: This article was originally posted in a slightly edited version at BBallbreakdown, but we're having some served issues over there so I thought I'd get it up here while it's still timely)